Year in Review: Spring Dog Part 2

I am a few days late writing part two of the Spring Dog review.  I have no real excuse besides for being a slacker.  So to continue from Tuesday I want to talk about Ellie since she came to live with us.  As I said on Tuesday, little did we know what we were in for.  I had grand plans for her in my mind.  She was going to be potty trained quickly, sleep in her crate at night or on her own bed on the floor, she would be good on walks, and she would play fetch with a tennis ball.  So far she is an expert with a ball, fairly good at walks, did pretty well with potty-training, but the sleeping arrangement was a pipe-dream.  I think that got ruined the very first night she came home.  We had a little crate set up in the living room for her with a blanket Alyssa made and we set up an air mattress on the floor so we would be able to take her out quickly at night.  We figured she would be exhausted after the car ride and getting acclimated to her new home.  Literally the minute her crate door closed she started howling bloody murder.  I tried to stay strong and let her go for over an hour but finally we let her out thinking “oh she can sleep with us just for tonight since she is used to having all her brothers and sisters close by.”  We tried to get her to lay with us but she wanted to run wild like a banshee.  This was our first glimpse into one of her major problems as a puppy which I will talk about in a few paragraphs.  My plan was to get her to sleep through the night in her crate and then let her come upstairs and sleep on the floor on her bed.  For nearly six weeks I slept on the couch with her in her crate so that I could let her out when she needed to go to the bathroom at night. I didn’t want to sleep upstairs in our bedroom because I didn’t want to carry her crate up every night and back down each morning.    Finally she was sleeping 10-4 straight through and I was extremely sick of sleeping on the couch so I tried her on her bed.  I knew it was going to be a process, but I was hell-bent on not having her sleep in bed with us.  The first night she lasted about an hour on the floor and then she wanted to come to lay with me, I put her back on the floor after 15 minutes and she lasted another hour.  It went on like this for 2 weeks, gradually getting her to sleep longer and longer on the floor until she spent 4 hours at one time there.  After that night though something in her snapped.  She did not want to sleep on the floor at all, I don’t know if it was the hot weather or what but she was restless the next few nights.  She would lay on her bed for 10 minutes and then wander around the room, bark to come up with me, scratch at the door, anything but sleep.  I knew I wouldn’t get much sleep with her wandering so I had her come to bed with me and she fell asleep almost instantly.  Big mistake.  After those few nights all hope of her sleeping on the floor was lost.  She was too comfortable snuggled up close to me.  Things haven’t changed much since then.  Even with Alyssa in bed now, Spring Dog is tucked in between us tight against me most nights.

I said that first night we got a glimpse of a problem she had.  As a puppy she had bouts of craziness, not excessive energy but episodes of pure craziness.  She would go outside and run laps around the yard jumping and trying to bite at anybody and anything that she came near.  These episodes would last for 5-10 minutes and then she would act like the never happened.  When she was at my parents house she would run and try to bite at Bella, when she was with my uncle’s puppy who was about the same age she would play very rough and bite a lot.  It was almost like she was having a seizure.  She was earning a reputation of a problem child and if things didn’t get better she wasn’t going to be able to play with anyone.  I knew that if these types of episodes happened in a child that an adjustment could help with them.  I knew that I could probably adjust her if I had to, but I didn’t feel totally confident and would rather an expert take care of her.  My aunt has been taking her collie to an veterinary chiropractor for years and I asked about her.  It happened that she was planning a trip with her dog in a week so I asked to tag along with Ellie.  My suspicions were correct and the vet said that an upper cervical adjustment should take care of her seizure like symptoms.  She examined Ellie and adjusted her upper neck, paws, and upper lumbar spine.  Ellie slept the whole way home and most of the evening.  Since that one adjustment, the episodes have stopped completely.  She still has a ton of energy, but the aggression has stopped completely.

The one thing that defines Ellie most people that know her is her love for a tennis ball.  I said one of my grand plans when we got her was to  get her to play fetch.  What I didn’t plan on was her being obsessed with tennis balls.  The first toy I bought for her was a package of tiny tennis balls.  From the first night she would chase those balls all over the house.  She would crouch down and pounce on them as they sat on the floor.  Eventually she moved on the full size balls and things would never be the same.  From the minute she wakes up to the time we go to bed a tennis ball is the only thing on her mind.  In the house she has one with her constantly, either trying to get you to throw it for her by shoving it under the couch so you have to get it out or carrying one in her mouth while dragging a blanket around.  Outside, she will chase a ball until the cows come home.  She has an amazing ability to catch the ball on a bounce, it is like she is an All-Star shortstop.  When we go to my parents house she runs inside, takes one bite of Bella’s food, and then starts searching for a ball.  Her obsession can get annoying at times.  At night when we want to watch tv we have to put her ball up or she will make it impossible to pay attention.  When this happens she stands on the couch and yelps trying to get it off the bookshelf.  I guess you could say we got more than we bargained for when we wanted her to like playing fetch.

As I said last post, Springer Spaniels are loyal and loving, and Ellie is no different.  She wants to be by my side at all times.  If I get up she is right there seeing what I am doing.  She waits for me when I shower or leave her home with Alyssa.  Besides her tennis ball, there is nothing she wants more than to make me happy.  They say dogs are man’s best friend and she is no different.  Even though she is crazy at times, I wouldn’t trade her for anything.  She has made drastic improvements since we got her and she will be a great dog for our future children.  Here are a few pictures of her in the past 7 months since we got her.

Year in Review: Spring Dog Part 1

For the next three weeks on Tuesday and Thursday we are going to give you a bit of a look back on our year, mainly the three big things that happened in our life this year.  First up this week is the Spring Dog, aka Elleanore.  Our search for a dog goes back close to three years.  You could say that back then it was more that Alyssa was searching for a dog that she called her own, but would stay with me since she couldn’t have one in her apartment.  There were a couple times that I was awfully close to coming home with a basset hound puppy from the pet store in Racine, but both times I came up with excuses to get out of it no matter how cute they were.  Living in a small apartment and having 30 credits worth of class a trimester, I knew a dog wasn’t in the plans for me while we were in Davenport.  The day we bought our house though, I couldn’t use the excuse of no room any longer and a puppy moved to the top of the to-do list that Alyssa and I made for the summer.  Next up was coming up with what kind of puppy to get.  Alyssa would have probably taken any dog with four legs and a tail, but I was a little more picky.  I said no ankle biters, poodles, or guard dog types.  Our dog would have to be an active dog that could go skiing and snow-shoeing with us and not have to be carried in a backpack.  I love Bernese Mountain Dogs and Bloodhounds, but we both decided our house didn’t have enough room for a 100 pound dog.  For our next choices we turned to hunting dogs.  Obviously this group would be capable of being outdoors with us and there were many options that weigh less than 100 pounds.  Immediately we ruled out Beagles, Labs, and Goldens because they are too popular; we wanted a breed that was a little more unique.  We tossed around ideas of Wire-Haired Pointers, Basset Hounds, Cocker Spaniels, English, Irish, and Gordon Setters, Brittany Spaniels, and finally Welsh or English Springer Spaniels.  Growing up we had a mixed breed dog, who was mostly Springer Spaniel, and two Basset Hounds; so I was partial to either of those breeds.   Like I said Alyssa would have taken just about any dog with a heartbeat, but she really wanted one that was kind of shaggy (think the Traveler’s Insurance “Worry, worry, worry” dog) and that she could cuddle with on the couch.  It took a little convincing but I finally brought Alyssa around to Springer Spaniels.

Katie, my first dog growing up, was a great dog.  She was loyal, playful, and loved being outside.  Everyone who has a Springer Spaniel raves about them.  I have many fond memories of Katie while I was growing up and those thoughts came flooding back when we decided to make Springers the top choice for our first dog together.  Next up was to decide which type of Springer we wanted.  Springers are made up of three close but fairly distinct types.  Two of the three bear the English name and one Welsh.  It’s easy to guess that the Welsh is the most different of the three.  They are slightly smaller and are red and white in color rather than liver or black.  The two English types are the field and the show; they are separated by their desired uses.  Show types are thicker bodied and have longer, flowing coats.  Field Springers are agile, have shorter coats, and are generally smaller.  My top choice was the Welsh Springer.  There was a major kink in the plans though.  Welsh Springers are fairly rare in the United States.  There are roughly 60 litters in the US each year so finding one when we were ready could have proven tough.  Along with making it tough to find a litter close by, rarity makes Welsh Springers expensive; most breeders charge well over $1000.  This fact led us to choose a field type Springer instead.

So after that was settled we had to find a puppy.  We searched the internet for weeks trying to find a litter that would be ready in June so that we would have enough time to train it over the summer.  We found a few in western Minnesota, western Iowa, South Dakota, or Ohio but that was a long way to travel for a puppy.  There were numerous litters in Wisconsin and Northern Michigan, but they were either ready in late April or late July.  These w0uld not fit with our plans so we were getting discouraged.  One day we found a mixed breed Springer puppy in a humane society about 30 miles from Davenport where Alyssa was still living.  I called and emailed multiple times and a week later when they finally got back to me the puppy was long gone.  Finally in late April we found a litter that was 4 weeks old, would be ready at the end of May, and was only 75 miles from here.  They had two female liver and white field type Springers left from a litter.  There were also males available, but we wanted a female.  Renee, the breeder, sent us pictures and we could not decide which one we wanted.  They were both adorable and it was a tough choice.  I liked one and Alyssa liked the other and our families were split as well.  In the end, and I don’t know how, we decided on the one I liked best.  At the time they called her GraceLynn, but we soon decided on Elleanore.  We paid our deposit and it was set.  We could bring her home in 4 weeks, which happened to be Memorial Day weekend so Alyssa could pick her up.  In the meantime, I would be going to Davenport for Alyssa’s graduation, so we arranged so that I could stop and see her on the way.  I’ll leave you with my first picture with the Spring Dog, little did I know what I was in for. Check back on Thursday to read about her life since she moved to Kingsford.